Tom Ford Exhumes the 1990s and It’s Almost Fabulous – New York Times

The 1990s have been resurgent of late, largely thanks to their somewhat ignoble contributions to contemporary life: reality television and âBaywatchâ; White House scandal and congressional shutdown; and, of course, the introduction of Donald J. Trump as a pop culture tabloid star. Well, we all need something to blame. Why not a time period?

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Tom Ford, spring 2018.Credit
Guillaume Roujas/Nowfashion

That it also happened to be an era when fashion had a knowing, energetic immediacy worth celebrating has been mostly overlooked. But on Wednesday, with the opening show of the New York spring 2018 season, Tom Ford came along to remind us.

Returning to New York with his first full-on traditional runway show after seasons of flirting with alternate venues (London! L.A.!) and forms (video! dinner theater!) and some timeouts for films, Mr. Ford took a trip down his own glam-cobblestoned memory lane. The 1990s, after all, were the heyday of his Gucci years â he became its creative director in 1994, and left 10 years later â when he burst onto the fashion scene, injecting the concept of postmodern irony into unabashed luxury, adding a dose of sex and making it cool.

Just consider that his new collection was in part the opening act for his new fragrance: Alliteratively titled, using first a crude word for sexual congress, followed by âFabulous.â You fill in the blank. (That is honestly the name on the label.)

Kind of, yes. In a millennial pink corridor â the color perhaps a reference to the generation Mr. Ford needs to attract and which missed the clothes the first time around â stretching through the Park Avenue Armory with lacquered walls and padded risers, in front of Chaka Khan, Helena Christensen, Cindy Crawford and Kim Kardashian West (among others), Mr. Ford sent out a series of sharp-shouldered one-button power jackets in pastel satins atop rolled-hem shorts paired with sequined T-shirts.

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Narciso Rodriguez, spring 2018.Credit
Casey Kelbaugh for The New York Times

There were blouson leather boy-band jackets with matching leather sweatpants; glittering two-tone T-shirt-dresses so short they looked more like shirts (maybe they were shirts, but if so they were sans bottoms) and aerobic-instructor leotards cut waist-high on the sides. Evening gowns were ruched net columns stretched peekaboo-sheer over the rear with long, sequined sleeves for contrast. Fuchsia, lavender and beige mixed it up with orange and electric blue, plus the usual black and white. None of it was very complicated or challenging. It was fun.